SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., May 8 /PRNewswire/ -- AvidBiotics Corp. announced the award of a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant from the National Institute of Health (NIH) for developing the company's proprietary technology against plague causing bacteria, Yersinia pestis.

The objective of the Phase I grant is to demonstrate the feasibility of using AvidBiotics' proprietary technology to build customized anti-bacterial therapeutics, prophylactics and diagnostics. If successful, this could lead to a new class of commercial bactericidal agents that have unique properties against drug-resistant bacterial organisms.

"The award of this grant is the first step in demonstrating and validating AvidBiotics' novel approach to developing a new class of anti-bacterial agents," said David Martin, Jr., CEO of AvidBiotics. "We shall determine whether our proprietary technologies can be effectively deployed to protect against a plague bioterrorism threat by providing effective diagnostic, prophylactic and/or therapeutics agents against weaponized Yesinia pestis bacteria."

The approach is based on the discovery by company co-founder Dr. Jeffery F. Miller of UCLA of a family of diversity-generating retroelements (DGR's) that function to vary in a precise manner DNA sequences and the proteins they encode. Using the DGR technology the company will manipulate specific binding components of particular bactericidal proteins in order to effectively target multiple strains of the plague bacterium.

About AvidBiotics

AvidBiotics Corp. is a biotherapeutics company with a proprietary technology platform focused on the development of genetically engineered protein products for the treatment of major bacterial diseases, with particular emphasis on antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Founded in 2004, by David Martin, Jr., Jeffery F. Miller, and James Knighton, on technology discovered by Dr. Miller and colleagues, AvidBiotics has technology that enables diversification of protein structures in a precise manner. The core technology has direct applicability to human therapeutics and diagnostics, veterinary medicine and agriculture, and research tools and reagents. AvidBiotics is headquartered in South San Francisco, California. For more information go to www.avidbiotics.com.